Call Off Your Ghost
by IntraSule
Summary: Peter still lingers in the hospital, forever a five year old waiting for the friend that grew up.
1. Chapter 1

_The green line went flat on the screen, paired with an ear-piercing tone that cut through the air and hopes of the surgeons in the room. One surgeon read the time- 31, October, 2014, 4:02 PM- and a nurse documented the time read. _

_Someone had burst into the double doors, a small man, his violet eyes wild with rage and horror as tears fell down his cheeks. He tried to reach for him, for the small, bloodied body, but another man, a larger one who seemed so stoic about it all if it weren't for the tears in his blue eyes, ran after the smaller one and held him back. The smaller man, the one with the violet eyes, fought against his husband's hold, screaming obscenities and begging to be allowed near his son, until he couldn't fight anymore, and all he could do was sink to the floor and weep in his husband's large arms as the doctors switched off the electronics, took out the steel tools from the open chest, and pulled the white sheet over their patient's body, covering the lifeless blue eyes and pulling it over his dirt-blond hair._

What year was it? Peter wondered this as he sat perched on top of the nurse's desk, his chin resting in the palms of his tiny hands. It couldn't have been many years since he didn't grow much, but still...

He looked into the room of a little girl named Lilli Zwingli and watched as her older brother- Basch, Peter learned from overhearing their conversations- wrap a covering around her neck, the ones Peter used to wear whenever his Papa or Mum took him to get haircuts from the friendly old barber who gave him candy afterward. Basch then undid Lilli's pretty braids and combed it out before picking up a pair of scissors and cutting them up to her chin.

He turned his attention to another patient, a boy named Feliciano who coughed in between his laughs from his bouts of pneumonia as his mother and father and older brother tried to keep the life in the atmosphere. If Peter knew Feliciano, the boy was going on excitedly about the pretty nurses caring for him and keeping him company.

Both patients flared intense jealousy in Peter's young body. Not only do they get regular company from family- and nurses and special visits when Feliciano and Lilli ask while Peter couldn't even get one nurse's attention- but they were both _getting taller. _They were both sick and neither of them leave their beds for months on end, and they couldn't keep their food down for weeks sometimes, but they still got bigger and taller and Feliciano was even getting a little bit of muscle on him (albeit his arms still looked stick-thin), while Peter still was too short. And it stunk because Peter felt completely fine; he exercised, he stretched his limbs daily, and he'd eat his meals everyday and keep it down if he could eat.

The thought of not being able to eat brought in another wave of jealousy in the little boy's heart. All over the floor, the kids here got to eat tons of sweets that Peter loves, from the chocolate pudding cups with whipped topping on it to slices of chocolate and vanilla cakes with a lot of rainbow sprinkles on the frosting, ones that look like the cake Mum bakes for Christmas with Papa. Nothing about this was fair-!

Peter stopped himself, inhaled and closed his eyes. He was getting angry at others for getting things that were good, and the envy was making him sick. To take away the envy, Peter let his mind clear, and then he told himself in his head that it is not good to be jealous for what others have just because he couldn't have it, and that he should in fact be happy for them because they were lucky enough to get them while they were so sick. So he let go of the envy over their familial moments and the delicious-looking cakes and puddings and cupcakes, but the twinge of bitterness over still being tiny remained. Moving one hand from under his chin, Peter flexed his little arm, sighing in disappointment at the barely-there bump on his upper arm. He compared his arm to Feliciano's arms and even Lilli's arms until he got bored of seeing how small he was. He pushed himself off the nurse's desk and sped down the slippery hall of the hospital, past the rooms of other children who were sick or injured or simply there for check-ups and slowed down until he reached the room.

Room B180, the one Peter was assigned... how long ago before they gave his bed away to other, sicker kids? He stared at the glowing blue line on the wall next to B180's door. Hoping that however many years have passed was good on his height, Peter turned around and pressed his back against the wall. He flattened his hair on his head with one hand and used his finger to trace a line above him. He turned back around and looked at where his magic finger left another glowing mark. Darn, it was the same place like last month, like every darn year since he first came here. He pouted, looked from side to side at the crowd of patients and doctors with nurses and students at their side, and turned around again. Instead of pressing his back to the wall first, he closed his eyes and pushed his insides down and away. With the lighter weight, Peter felt his feet lift from the floor and his body getting higher up. He opened his eyes and leaned against the wall, tracing another line above his head for the month.

He descended and gazed up proudly at the line he drew higher on the wall with his hands on his hips. Well, even if he can't grow taller like the other kids, he could at least take pride in knowing that he learned a trick that the other kids can't do. _Mum would be so proud!_

"Okay, baby, now just put this strand through this loop..."

Peter blinked as the voice cut through his thoughts. Another voice spoke too, followed by bubbly laughter and some small claps and cheers. Peter raised an eyebrow and leaned until his head appeared in the doorway. Sitting on one of the room's beds- Peter's old bed, as a matter of fact- was a little girl that looked around Peter's age. She was tiny compared to her parents sitting in the chairs next to her bed, a papa with long golden hair that Uncle Den would have laughed at and some scruff under his chin, a mama whose skin was slightly darker than the little girl's skin and thick braids of hair was tied high behind her hair, and the girl herself, a girl who had dark brown hair in big, red bows on either side of her brown cheeks. Peter couldn't see what the little girl and her family were making from where he stood, but guessed from the baskets of yarn that maybe they were making a scarf or something. Whatever they were doing, Peter watched on in fascination. He placed the palms of his hand on the threshold and took a step inside the room.

"Am I finished yet, Mama?" The little girl asked. She held up a tiny patchwork that had a red flower in a yellow and white striped background.

"Not yet, baby," the lady chuckled. "You have to do that thirty more times before it's finished.

The little girl puffed her cheeks and lowered her work. "But that's going to take forever! I won't be able to finish it before winter comes..."

"Not with that attitude, you won't," the papa stated. He started to say something else, but someone cleared his throat. All of them looked towards the door, including Peter- who didn't realize that he was floating closer to the family and further away from the door itself- and a doctor stood there with his clipboard in his arm. The papa and mama glance at each other and smiled back at their daughter. "Michelle, we're going to talk to the nice doctor for a moment, do you think you'll be able to work on your scarf until we come back?"

The daughter, Michelle, nodded. "Mhm!"

"Okay, we'll be right back," the mama leaned closer to give Michelle a kiss on the forehead. The papa did the same and they both stood and walked out of the room, walking through Peter and closing the door behind them.

Peter glanced over his shoulder and looked back at the little girl on the bed, watching her fingers turn the needles in and out, up and down, make loops and close them until she made one row after the other of yellow and red and white in such a quick fashion that Peter's eyes couldn't keep up.

"That's a cool scarf," Peter commented, mostly to himself though, since no one can hear him-

"Huh! Oh, thanks!" Michelle grinned. She lifted her work-in-progress up to the light to examine it.

Peter let out a small gasped and looked up at the girl, who seemed to stare back right at him. He looked over his shoulder again, and all around the room. "Were you... talking to me?"

"Uh, yeah?" she replied with a quirk of her eyebrow and looked around the room with him. "Who else am I going to talk to?"

"Oh, sorry, I just..." Peter looked down at his fingers as he twiddled them. "Uh, I never really had a girl talk to me before..." _Or anyone, really, _he wanted to add. _For a long, long time._

"Well, you are talking to one right now, right? It's not bad so far, is it?"

"Oh, no, no, it isn't bad, I just, er..."

Michelle stared at the little boy, waiting for him to say whatever he had on his mind. A minute passed in silence, and Michelle beamed and patted the space in front of her. "Come on, sit down, but not on the chairs because Mama and Papa are sitting there. My name's Michelle!"

"I've heard," Peter said as he floated up and landed gently on the bed with his legs crossed. "Uh, my name's Peter- what?"

Michelle sat there with her mouth gaping open at him, her golden eyes bulging. "Whoa, did you just-?!"

"Did I just what?" Peter asked. He then made a soft "oh" sound. "You mean float? Yeah, I did. Why, did it scare you?"

"No! That is so cool! How did you that?"

"Well," Peter looked down at his fingers again, noticing how dirty his nails looked and wishing that his Papa was here to help him clean them out. "Well, I don't know. One day, I was just able to float and I did it sometimes. It's not as cool as what you're doing, though. My Papa did that all of the time and made me and my brother and even my dog hats and scarves for winter every year so we don't get cold. They were really soft and warm."

"Wow. Are they here with you, Peter?"

Peter shook his head. "No, they're not. They never came back." His voice became softer, and he swallowed so that the lump forming in his throat would go away. He didn't want to cry, not in front of such a pretty girl-

He then froze, sadness immediately replaced with embarrassment. He didn't think that, did he?

"I'm sorry, Peter. Hey, what are you here for?"

"I had something wrong with my heart, Mum said. He said it was-"

"_He?_"

Peter nodded, now remembering that not many people call their second father "Mum" and that that was a sort of special thing for him and his older brother. "Yeah, I call my other father 'Mum' because he's really mom-like even when he's manly."

"Oooh, okay. Do you call your mama 'Daddy' then-?"

"Michelle, who are you talking to?" Michelle's father asked. He and his wife looked around, concerned.

Michelle gestured her hand towards the empty space in front of her. "Mama, Papa, this is Peter!" She looked back at the space in front of her and carried on with the conversation.

"Eh, Michelle, there's no one-" Her mother gently grabbed her husband's sleeve and shook her head. "What?"

"Francis, can't you see she made a new friend here?"

"Not really, no."

"Francis-"

"Makena, this is not a healthy thing for her." Francis glanced at his daughter and leaned closer to her mother's ear and continued in a hushed voice, "She's obviously been here foo too long and is very lonely, we need to break this habit before it gets to her the longer she stays here."

"I can hear you, yanno," Michelle grumbled. She reached forward and placed her hand on the sheet, her palm cupped as if covering something. "And so can Peter!"

Peter looked down at his hand, which was covered by Michelle's hand. He didn't really feel the touch, but he could tell that her hand was soft and warm. His mouth hung open as his mind tried to sort through the weird feelings bubbling inside him.

By the window, a potted plant tilted over the edge and crashed to the floor.

"Oh, mon Dieu, how the hel- heck did that happen?" Francis hurried around the bed and went to the mess. He crouched and tried to pick up as many pieces of the pot as he can.

Makena grabbed some facial tissue and a pamphlet to use as a makeshift broom and dustpan to clean up the soil.

As her parents cleaned, Michelle turned her attention back to Peter. She scooted closer to him and smiled. "How old are you Peter? I'm five!"

"You're five? Hm, what year is it?"

"It's, um, it's 2025!"

"Oh, then that would mean..." Peter trailed off as he counted on his fingers. "2022, 2021... I should really be sixteen, then!" He sighed and crossed his arms. "But I'm still five and short."

"Being five isn't so bad!" Michelle chirped. She tilted her head and gave that smile that was really starting to make Peter nervous in a good way and squeezed her hand around Peter's, surprising the young boy. "That means we can be friends!"

"Oh, no..." Francis muttered as he and Makena crossed the room to the trashcan.

Peter ignored them and instead returned the warm grin.

Makena Bonnefoy: APH Kenya


	2. Chapter 2

Today was was a sunny morning. Michelle could tell that the sun was shining brightly in the sky the moment she awoke from her sleep by the way the edges of the window's blinds glowed, so as soon as the last of her dream cleared from her mind, she reached for the call button on the bed's rail and tapped the red button.

"Yes, hun?" The kind voice spoke through the speaker on the wall.

Michelle held the button on her handheld tool and lifted it close to her mouth. She replied into the speaker, "I'm awake. Can you please come here for a second?"

The nurse chuckled softly, making Michelle wonder what was so funny, and said, "Okay, dear, I'll be there in a moment."

"Okay." Michelle balanced the call button on the bed rail again and sat there. She rubbed her eye with the back of her little fist and yawned loudly. Soon, a knock came from the door and, fluffing her messy loose coils of hair, Michelle called out, "Come in!"

The door pushed open, and Nurse Katyusha, in her pink floral uniform that Michelle loves so much because it reminded her of Mama and Papa's garden that they used to let her play in, came into the room with a grin on her face and a stethoscope hanging from her neck. She tilted her head and smiled. "Good morning, Miss Bonnefoy! How are you?"

"Good morning, Nurse Katyusha!" Michelle said back. "I'm fine, I had my good night's sleep like my doctor told me to get!"  
>"Well, that's good!" the nurse clapped her hands together and straightened the band in her hair. "Keep following your doctor's orders and you'll be better in no time!"<br>"Yep!"  
>"So, what can I do for you, little missy?"<br>Michelle pointed at the window. "Ma'am, could you please open the blinds? The sun is up and I want to get some sun into the room. It's kinda dark in here."

Nurse Katyusha nodded. "Of course, Miss Bonnefoy." She walked around the bed to the window and pulled on the cord until the base of the blinds lifted high on the window. She pulled the cord to the side until she was sure it locked in place and, therefore, the base won't fall down.

More of the sunlight poured into the room and found its way onto Michelle's bed. Like a flower whose petals started to open to soak in the morning's light, Michelle stretched out her arms and let the glow's warmth heat her arms and open palms.

"That should do it- wait." The nurse turned towards Michelle and pointed at the windowsill. Her eyebrow rose as she asked, "Didn't there used to be a plant here yesterday?"

Michelle nodded. "Yep! But Peter broke it with his magic and my Mama and Papa had to throw it away. Oh! Is Peter up, too?"

Nurse Katyusha stared at the little girl on the bed, then at the wall behind the bed as her fingers went up to play with the strands of hair that escaped from her ponytail's scrunchie. "Peter? Peter, who, dear?"

"Peter-" Michelle stopped to think. She hummed as she tried to pull up the last name in her mind. "Um... I don't know his last name. But he had on a gown like me!" She tugged at the front of her hospital gown. "And he said he was sick, too, with a heart thing like me, so I know he has to be here!"

"Sweetie, I don't think there is a patient here named Peter."

"But I met him yesterday!"

"Okay, then so he must be a new intake," Nurse Katyusha said mostly to herself, thinking about how bad it would look if there was a new patient in the children's ward that she, as the charge nurse, doesn't know about.

Michelle shook her head, not knowing the word "intake" but understanding it well enough to know that it must mean a kid who was sick like her. "Nope, he isn't new. He said his Mama and Papa stopped coming to visit him, so I think he's been here a long time. But he doesn't look it because he looks five like me but is actually sixteen years old."

Nurse Katyusha blinked as she continued to stare at the girl, trying to work through the sudden barrage of information in her head. Her hair-playing hand paused in twirling a lock of hair. "Oh," she said, letting down her hand. She shook her head. "I'm sorry, hun, but there is no Peter in this hospital."

"But there is! I was talking to him yesterday and my Mama was, too, and Peter told me about your pretty rose pin you had on your sweater yesterday, so he was here!"

"Michelle-" the nurse sighed. "Michelle, are you sure this wasn't a dream you just woke up from?"

"Mhm!" Michelle shook her head and pushed back the bush of hair that got in her face. "I'm sure, I'm sure!"

"Then I may be mistaken." The gentle smile came back to Nurse Katyusha's face. "Don't worry, Michelle, if Peter is here, I may be able to find him later. But in the meantime-" she bent down with her hands on her knees and looked Michelle in her eyes, "-how about I get you some breakfast, okay? What would you like to have?"

Michelle pouted, feeling the urge to defend Peter's existence yet again, but looked down at her covered knees instead of speaking up again. "Just orange juice, please," she murmured.

"Aw, Michelle, don't feel so down! I'm sure Peter will be around here to visit you, wherever he may be! Hey, how about I sneak you a cup of strawberry yogurt with your juice, hm?"

The young girl's face brightened. "Yeah! Please!"

"Alright, then! I'll be right back!" Nurse Katyusha walked out of the room. She placed the door stopper down onto the floor with her foot so that the door would stay open in her absence. Her cheerful humming could be heard even as she went farther away from the room, and Michelle picked up the tune in her own humming.

Ten minutes into the wait, Michelle leaned down the side of her bed and picked up the wicket basket of yarn and needles. She lifted it over the rail with a grunt and plopped it down in front of her. Picking through the balls of yarn and tools, Michelle searched through the stuff until she pulled out the unfinished scarf she and her mother started the day before. She wrapped and looped a new strand of yarn onto one of her plastic blue needles until she created a "chain" (she tilted her head in puzzlement; she still doesn't know why her mother and father call it a chain when it doesn't even look like a chain) and loomed it into the scarf as a new color layer. Still humming the tune Nurse Hedervay left her with, Michelle clicked her needles together and pushed one end of the yarn into the hole of another in a consistent pattern.

She then stopped, her hands lowering into her lap. She gazed out the window, where she can see all the life of the hospital out there. Healthier children were running around playing with either their family or the friends they made here; children who were too sick to do anything but were allowed recess out of their rooms sat in some benches with their visitors; some special nurses who help children walk again were helping kids with metal legs practice moving in them. Michelle quickly glanced at the clock and back out the window. Whether or not she knew how to read clocks properly, she still knew it was going to be a long time before her parents got off work and come to see her today. And her friend...

"Peter, are you here?" She whispered to herself.

"You rang?"

Michelle whipped her head towards the door. "Peter!" She gasped at the blond head leaning in through the doorway.

Peter floated from the doorway and to Michelle's hospital bed. He flew his body over the rail and landed in a sitting position in the same place where she offered him yesterday. "Hi!"

"Ah, Peter, I thought you left!" Michelle pouted.

"Really? Why?"

"Because," Michelle huffed and placed her needles into her lap to cross her arms. "Because Nurse Katyusha said that there wasn't a boy named Peter in the hospital and she probably thought I made you up like Papa did, but now that you're here, I guess that means that she's wrong, too, so it doesn't matter." She took up her knitting supplies again and lifted the little scarf. "Hey, I worked on my scarf some more!"

"Wow!" Peter touched his fingers to the garment, only to withdraw his hand when his fingertips pushed through the fabric. "It's getting longer! Have you been working on this all night?"

"Sorta." Michelle shrugged. "I couldn't sleep, so one of the nurses let me play with my knitting stuff until I could fall asleep."

"But didn't you tell Nurse Katyusha that you had a lot of sleep last night? I thought you fell asleep when I left?"

Michelle shrugged again, and worked on her scarf. "I lied; I didn't want Nurse Kat to get upset and call Doctor Braginsky. He'll just come talk to me about resting and how much I need it in order to grow and get better."

"Ooooh," Peter nodded.

"Yeah. He kinda scares me a little when he gets serious, but he doesn't scare me a lot; he's really nice, so I do try to sleep like he tells me to."

"Yeah, I know what you mean." Peter crossed his legs and held on to one of the calves as he leaned back in boredom. He looked up at the plaster ceiling. "Doctor Braginsky does seem like a scary guy sometimes when he gets really serious, but I think it's because he's so big, like my Papa. But I like the jokes and stories he tells the other children." Peter giggled. "He's really funny!"

"Mhm!" Michelle giggled too. "Did you hear about the joke where the magician lost his bunny and found him in his Mommy's soup?"

Peter nodded and threw back his head as he laughed out loud. Michelle joined along with him, retelling some of her favorite jokes from Doctor Braginsky and an old story from his childhood in Russia.

"Did you hear- about the- the man from Moscow who was late for work?" Michelle said in-between her fits of giggles.

Peter tried to reply, but was spasming so much from laughter that all he could do was shake his head, even though he heard the joke before.

"The man from Moscow was walking down the street a-and another guy tried to talk to him. So the man from Moscow put up his hand and said, 'not now, my good sir, I'm Russian to work, here!'"

"Bwah hahahahahahaha!" Peter rolled onto his side and wrapped his arms around his guts. Although his stomach really didn't feel like bursting from laughter, holding his stomach in was a reflex he always did when he was laughing too hard for his own good, and it was one he picked up again when Doctor Braginsky started working here six years ago.

"And there was one where- oh!"

"Michelle?" Peter twisted around in the air until he was on his hand and knees. He reached towards the girl as she clutched her fingers into her left chest, her wide eyes boring into a spot on the bed. "Michelle-!"

"I-I'm fine," Michelle whimpered. She closed her eyes and gritted her teeth. Her face remained twisted like that for a few seconds, until whatever was going on in her chest stopped aching so harshly, leaving her tired-looking. "M-maybe we should stop... for now."

Peter furrowed his eyebrows in worry, but moved back to give her some breathing room. He nodded and pulled his knees up to his face, looking away at the floor. "Okay, yeah." The room became quiet, and Peter asked, "So, what are you going to do for today?"

"Nothing really." She moved her knitting supplies aside and mimicked Peter's move, but focused on his blue eyes. "I'm gonna wait for Mama and Papa to come visit after work, and then knit some more so I can finish this scarf by Christmas time. Until then, I'm going to take a bath and take my medicine. What about you?"

Peter shook his head. His eyes looked up to Michelle, and realizing that she was watching him, squeezed himself tighter behind his knees. "I don't have anything to do. I can't talk to the nurses or other kids, and I can't really pick up toys to play with, so I guess I'll just be floating around here and stuff..."

"Hey, about the nurses, how come they don't listen to you? They don't do that with the other kids here, not me, either. Did you do something bad?"

Peter shook his head again, but he did wonder if he did something terrible to get so many cold shoulders over the years. "I don't know. I don't think I did..."

"I don't think you did anything wrong, either. There's gotta be something else, then, because the nurses here are nice!" Michelle hummed in thought, but grew silent when she couldn't think of anything. "...You know, maybe-"

"Aaah, Michelle!" Nurse Katyusha rushed into the room with a carton of orange juice in her pocket, a cup of yogurt with a spoon in one hand, and the other hand holding a packet of pills. "I'm so sorry, dear, I had to wait for the vendors to restock the food and then had to get your medicine for the hour. But here it is! Oh, and I'm sorry sweetheart, but I couldn't find anyone named Peter in the hospital."

"It's okay, Nurse Kat! Peter's right here!" Michelle gestured to the empty space, where the mentioned young boy waved shyly at the nurse.

Nurse Katyusha grinned and glanced back and forth between the little girl and the empty space on the bed. "Oh, I see! Hello, Peter! My name is Nurse Katyusha!" She handed Michelle her yogurt and spoon and held out her hand, feeling only a gentle cool breeze pass between her fingers. "My, Peter, you are such a handsome young man, isn't he, Michelle?"

"Mhm! Very!" Michelle's yogurt-covered lips smiled widely. She then tilted the yogurt cup back over her mouth and slurped the content into her mouth. Peter blushed at the compliment and giggled at the slurping noise.

Nurse Katyusha closed her eyes and took a napkin out of her pocket as the young girl giggled. "Michelle, please use your spoon."


End file.
